1049 Industrial Drive
West Berlin, NJ 08091
www.horizonlabel.com


Horizon Label’s continued success has been built on a fruitful partnership. Ronald Lutz, vice president, and Vincent J.  Melapioni (VJ), owner of Hillside, NJ-based Beau Label, came together in 2020 to purchase Horizon Label from its previous owner, Paul Falkowski. Lutz and Melapioni have been quite active the last two years, investing in equipment upgrades, LED lighting for the facility, and exploring possible expansion.

Falkowski, a label salesman who worked for Dennison before the company merged with Avery in 1990, purchased Bicen Label in 1999. The company, which was established in 1976 and named for the bicentennial, became a label and tag facility under Falkowski’s watch. He subsequently changed the name of the business to Horizon Label. The company grew precipitously over the course of 20 years, but Falkowski made the decision to enter retirement in 2020. That’s when Lutz and Melapioni joined forces.

“I had worked for Sancoa International, which was purchased by CCL, for 23 years before joining another company,” says Lutz. “I was coming home from work one night when I received a phone call from a colleague from my Sancoa days. He wanted to know if I was interested in running the plant at Horizon Label. I then interviewed with Paul and joined as vice president of operations about nine years ago, and I’ve been here ever since.

“At that time, the question I had for Paul was, ‘When you retire, could I possibly buy the company or be part of that purchasing group?’ That was always the goal for me when I joined Horizon Label,” he adds.

For Melapioni, he received a tip from one of his vendors. “A vendor brought this opportunity to me, saying I should talk to Paul because the company might be for sale,” recounts Melapioni. “I reached out to Paul, and we started that process. I wouldn’t approach this deal without Ron being here, though, because I needed someone at the facility on a daily basis and I knew how well the company was running under his guidance.”

Labels and packaging have become the family business for Melapioni, who owns and operates Beau Label. He wanted to continue growing his company, and Horizon Label represented the ideal situation. “I have a nephew, two sons, a cousin and my sister who all work with me,” he says. “I never wanted them to feel that financially they made a mistake picking the path of going into the label business. My family was my motivation for this acquisition.”

The partnership has been beneficial for both Horizon Label and Beau Label. As each company offers different printing capabilities and specialties, yet there are many common aspects between the two, they can refer work to one another. Both companies can better service their customers. The redundancy of the two plants is comforting to many large customers, as well.

“It’s nice because I can call Beau Label, since we’re about an hour and a half away, and ask if they have a roll of a certain material,” explains Lutz. “If I need material and VJ has it, I’ll be on the road at 5 a.m. to beat the traffic and then I’m back here at Horizon by noon.

“The company runs as smoothly as we ever have,” adds Lutz. “Everyone here keeps grinding away. So far, it’s been a pleasure for me. Sometimes partnerships aren’t that good, but for us it’s been great because I believe we think a lot alike. It’s been an awesome experience.”

“In that way the partnership has been really good for both plants,” adds Melapioni. “The honeymoon period is over and we still feel the same way – so that’s a good thing.”

Today, Horizon Label operates with 15 employees in a facility space of 10,000 square feet. The company boasts five presses from Nilpeter and Mark Andy. Of the two Mark Andy presses, one has been outfitted with a digital inkjet unit from DICE Graphic Technologies. The DICE GT3000 Series digital inkjet printer has enabled Horizon Label to target business that previously would not have made sense for its flexo presses, such as shorter-run work for local breweries and wineries.

Horizon has also established a strong customer base in the food and beverage, automotive, health and beauty, and cosmetics markets.

Upon acquiring the company in 2020, Lutz and Melapioni immediately invested in upgrading equipment. “We brought in two Rotoflex rewinders in the fall of 2020 right after the acquisition,” he states. “We have four rewinders now. In addition, one rewinder has a die station, so if we have a customer that needs blank labels, we could do so more efficiently. This way, I’m not running a blank job in the pressroom and taking it to a rewinder; it’s all done on the rewinder, which increases our press capacity.”

The investments have not stopped there, either. The Horizon Label facility has added LED curing to its presses, as well as LED lighting throughout the entire building. Plus, in an effort to reduce its carbon footprint, Horizon Label will be installing solar panels on the facility.

Melapioni has also emphasized keeping inventory at both Beau Label and Horizon Label, an endeavor that has been beneficial during the supply chain challenges. “One thing that we changed from the previous ownership is carrying extra inventory,” he says. “If we were still operating that way, we’d be in trouble like a lot of print companies struggling to procure materials.”

“Since the pandemic, we’ve picked up a few customers walking through the front door here at Horizon because their current label supplier couldn’t get materials,” adds Lutz. “One customer came in, we quoted the job, he liked the quote and we had the material, so we won that business.”

Culture building
Horizon Label’s team of 15 boasts longevity and a strong culture, one that is based around customer service. Upon acquiring the company, Melapioni did not want to make too many changes to operations, instead opting for equipment upgrades.

“The company was run well before we bought it, and it’s being run well now,” he notes. “For me, when acquiring the company, I didn’t want to disrupt their flow. A lot of the success here I believe had to do with Ron, and I try to handle as much of the backend business that I can to free him up. The addition of Ron’s son, Matt, has allowed Ron to oversee the plant and take care of his responsibilities in the office. It’s really been a pleasure working with everyone here.”

A big part of the company’s culture can be traced to ownership. Lutz and Melapioni wanted to ensure that the employees were taken care of throughout the ownership transition from Falkowski, which both owners agree was “seamless.”

“One thing that changed through the ownership transition was for the employees, since they were worried that Paul was going to retire and that Horizon was going to shut its doors,” explains Lutz. “The morale definitely improved a lot when VJ and I took over, because our people knew that the company was pushing forward.”

According to Lutz, the Horizon’s success also lies in its employees’ experience. On the pressroom floor, workers, including the newer hires, have an average experience of 25 years in the label and package printing business. That dedication and drive was on full display throughout the pandemic, as the company continued operating successfully.

“We’re a small company, and we’re a very tight-knit family,” states Lutz. “Everybody has stuck together here, especially through the pandemic, and worked hard through it. Our personnel really doesn’t change, and everyone came in and was available for us.”

Melapioni and Lutz took several significant strides to ensure their employees’ health and safety throughout the pandemic, both at Horizon Label and Beau Label. Ownership invested in fog machines and used the same chemical that the MTA uses to sanitize buses and subway cars. In addition, they instituted a regimen that was complete with hand sanitizers, social distancing and masks.

“The culture is good, and the people are good here,” says Lutz. “I don’t ask anybody out there on the production floor to do anything I wouldn’t do. I’ll do anything that needs to be done, even taking out the garbage. And that’s the culture here. I have two customer service people, Colleen and Jenna, and they’ll be out in the plant moving boxes around. That’s also a commitment to our customers. They’ll dig in for the customers to make sure their jobs get done as needed when needed.”

At Horizon Label, Lutz has also gone to great lengths to ensure that the employees have a say in the operations. “We have an open-door policy here,” he adds. “My door is always open if anyone ever has a question or a complaint. If any one of employees has a problem or needs something, I tell them to call me or come and see me, and we’ll figure out the issue.”

“We strive to be fair, honest and honorable here, and it trickles through to the employees, and you can see it,” adds Melapioni. “We really have a good crew. They’re nice people and they work hard. They’re professionals, they come in and do their job, and it’s nice. It really is a family here.”

On the ‘Horizon’
Even though the company has thrived under new ownership, Lutz and Melapioni have no intentions of resting on their laurels.

The switch to LED has been the first step into the future. “The LED lights brighten up the plant, and the LEDs on the press have changed the mindsets of all the pressmen because now we don’t have to wash up at night,” states Lutz. “The LED lights on the presses have certainly made us more efficient, and the LED lighting in the building made us more efficient, as well.”

“The inks are more vibrant and run cleaner,” adds Melapioni. “We print with better quality, and it’s definitely more durable as opposed to a water-based ink. In addition, the LED lights use less power than the air dryers.”

Sustainability has also played a big role for Horizon Label, as Lutz notes that many customers inquire about the company’s environmental practices. “We have customers who ask for quotes and they want to make sure we’re using recycled paper,” he says. “They ask what materials we’re using that can be recycled – our customers are asking about sustainability, there’s no doubt. There’s definitely growing interest for us and our customers. If there’s something that we can put into that equation that’s recyclable – even if not the whole equation – it certainly helps. There are incentive programs for energy efficiency, which are great because NJ wants companies to be greener and use less power.”

“It’s really important to us to leave a softer carbon footprint,” adds Melapioni.

In the future, Horizon Label will continue to explore new equipment opportunities, as well as possible expansion. By expanding the West Berlin, NJ facility, Horizon Label would have more room to stock materials. “If we had the warehouse space to house more materials, it would make us that much more efficient,” says Melapioni. “We can use some space for finished goods inventory, because we do maintain inventories for several customers, and then we’d use the rest of the space for more raw materials.”

From an equipment standpoint, the company is going to look at upgrading one of its presses to a 13" flexo press in the near future. “We would be increasing capacity while giving us more redundancy, as well as better quality,” says Melapioni. “Down the road, we’ll probably replace one of our older flexo presses with a wider press to increase capacity and versatility.”

In addition to new equipment, Horizon Label will explore entering new markets like shrink sleeves. “We cover a pretty wide range of labels here, and I think shrink sleeves are definitely something in our future at Horizon Label,” comments Lutz. “That’s another benefit of LED curing – for running shrink. I think shrink is definitely growing. With a lot of our jobs for bottles, if we’re printing the labels for these companies, we could also print the shrink sleeves for the tops of the bottles. There’s a whole process from A to Z, including seaming, that we’ll look at in the future. Once we get into it, it’ll be nice for our business to take care of the whole process.”